Balancing the Books: Uncle Sam Must Collect $56,621 Per Man, Woman and Child in the United States

Can the United States of America afford a decades-long war with ISIS? Can the U.S. contain Russia should it annex its neighbors? Can we confront North Korea if its dictator teams up with a nuclear-armed Iran? Will Big Government have an incentive to secure our borders if we need new and future taxpayers — legal and otherwise — to service the interest on our debt?

There’s no doubt the United States has the best-equipped military in the world. But that may not add up to a whole lot of security if we don’t get a handle on the national debt — before it’s too late.

“I.O.U.S.A.” is as relevant today as it ever was when it debuted in 2008 on the heels of former Comptroller General David Walker’s two-year Fiscal Wake-Up Tour. The only difference? Instead of ~$9 trillion the U.S. is running a deficit today in excess of $18T. That works out to a staggering $3 million per minute — for a figure currently in excess of $56K per American!:

2 Responses

The destruction of this country will be due to GREED. If you think about it it’s the same way the country and it’s “wealth” was built in the first place. GREED. Stealing, lying and cheating and murdering to have MORE for themselves,and to hell with everyone else.
I don’t understand why the members of Congress whom are all millionaires, need to collect salaries or have us pay for their exquisite health care benefits? Seems to me if Soc Sec and Medicare and Medicaid are in danger of insolvency then these government representatives should serve their posts without collecting any salaries. Face it, if one has millions they can make enough money from investments alone without even having to work., They can easily serve these positions w/o drawing any salary at all and STILL live like millionaires right? The only explanation for this mess is GREED and of the wealthy. While it doesn’t mean that only the rich are greedy, one can be poor and greedy too. Avarice doesn’t operate by what one has but their perspective of the psychological dependency on having “more” and more and more. Much more than what is necessary. How much does one man need to have? and what good does it to him and his children and future generations to hoard wealth that sits in his vaults. The top income “earners” and I use that word loosely, have enough and could easily give away enough that would uplift the entire country which would both stabilize the government coffers as well as uplift the needy and much work could be done and that would be true progress. Greed , pride and ignorance will destroy this country, and these seem to be infectious and dominate our American culture. Those who don’t have want and those who have want more. Never satisfied. The other problem is that we have far too much information and not enough wisdom For knowledge without wisdom is dangerous. We need to stop digesting and distributing so much knowledge and learn Wisdom. Also, the military industrial complex is another culprit, it is the means of an Imperialistic system of domination through violence and stealing resources and labor. It is immoral to allow people to die and to increase poverty while continuing to fund millionaires war games. We do not need to spend more on this budget, we do so because certain wealthy people derive profit and they are greedy! Why cannot there be if we are in such sad state some legislation whereas those MOST fortunate pay the piper to get us balanced?> They would continue to live their lives as MILLIONAIRES if they did so, but instead they take from the poor and take and take. This is against all reason, morality and common sense. If the rich WANTED TO they could EASILY eradicate poverty and replenish government coffers and STILL live as millionaires, so what I do not understand is why don’t they? How does it benefit them to have the country deteriorate and people suffer? I understand that the rich gain at the expense of the many but when Greed dominates man , he in the end will only destroy HIMSELF.

Thanks for the comment, Deborah. You asked “How does it benefit them to have the country deteriorate and people suffer?”

I suspect one explanation is that achieving a particularly high level of success requires a very specialized skills and a singular focus upon their own goals and careers. In other words, they’re good at what they do — but not necessarily at understanding how their actions reflect upon society at large. When individuals insulate themselves from the cares and concerns of the general population through the mechanism of wealth they also lose touch with basic things like how much it costs to budget for necessities such as childcare and food — because they have personal chefs and nannies and personal assistants to pay their bills. The ultra-wealthy no longer interact with the “normal” channels within retail, education, healthcare, etc.

Undoubtedly some are “divorced” from the plight of others thanks to their own narcissism. Those who inherit wealth, in particular, may no longer view themselves within the broader context of community and identify instead with members of their own class (and a small one at that). Others may start out with the same capacity the rest of us do to empathize with one another yet become sequestered by their own success and begin to lose touch with how the “other half” lives.

There was a study out some years back in which CEO was found to be among the jobs most likely to attract sociopaths. As a society, we typically associate serious mental illnesses with the potential to seriously impair a persons life. But in some cases the mentally ill are motivated by a deep insecurity that manifests as “over achievement”. This subset of successful individuals are particularly harmful because they promote superficial beliefs about materialism, power and wealth as “proof” of their own intellectual or moral superiority over those who are less powerful.

When you ask why the elite don’t seem to care if the nation deteriorates around them and people suffer for their actions it is because they have managed to convince themselves that 1) they’re just doing their job — it’s little more than a game and they’re not going to apologize for being good at it, and 2) the less fortunate do not deserve a hand up because they failed to earn it. These are the mechanisms by which the Elite become detached from the realities “average Americans” face.